Saturday, March 26, 2016

The Grand Island Independent: "Crisis Center Executive Director LexAnn Roach said the lack of transportation can even mean domestic violence and sexual assault survivors stay with or stay in contact with an abuser.
“Without their jobs or without the means to get their children to school or to attain other needed services, they have no hope of having an independent life away from that abuser,” she said.
Grand Island attorney Ron Depue, who formerly chaired the United Way board and its fundraising campaign, said now that Grand Island has reached metropolitan status due to population growth, the bar is higher for the services that need to be provided.
“As a community, I think we’ve fallen short of accepting responsibility to provide effective public transit,” he said."

Star Tribune: "Thus, I propose making all public transportation free for residents and visitors.

Tallinn, Estonia, a city with a population slightly larger than that of Minneapolis, already has successfully done it, though its free transportation is available only to city residents. We would need to offer free public transportation to everyone in order to create a notably unique, destination-defining enticement that people would mention in the same breath as Mall of America and niceness when discussing travel to the Twin Cities.

Furthermore, making public transportation free would reduce traffic, if only somewhat in the short-term, and give struggling families better access to jobs and other resources. It’s a public-relations trifecta. Of course, people aren’t going to book vacations exclusively based on the allure of free transportation like they would Disney World. But combined with the current surge of our profile as an outstanding and affordable place to visit and live, it could help boost us into the travel planning echelons of San Francisco and New York."

Monday, March 14, 2016

Kearney Courier: ""Each year, more than 77 million rides are provided by Missouri transit providers in both urban and rural areas. In addition, thousands of people are employed. OATS alone employs over 700 people throughout its 87-county service region," an OATS release states.
Despite the value transit brings to Missouri in both jobs and service, Missouri’s investment in public transportation has been declining since 2000, the release states.
“Just last year we talked about how Missouri ranks 40th nationally when it comes to the annual per capita investment with only 50 cents per person being invested in transportation,” said OATS Executive Director Dorothy Yeager. “Now the 2013 numbers have been released and we are down to just 9 cents – not even a dime per person is spent on transportation,” added Yeager.
OATS is headquartered in Columbia, with seven regional offices and four satellite offices across the state. OATS, Inc. is a not-for-profit corporation providing specialized transportation for senior citizens, people with disabilities and the rural general public in 87 Missouri counties.
Last year, OATS provided 1.5 million rides to more than 26,700 Missourians covering 13 million miles."

Sunday, March 13, 2016

These changes are unlikely to include hoverboards, teleportation or floating cars, as many futuristic movies like to depict public transportation. Rather, Rickert says that the most realistic change movies predict are self-operated cars.

“Cars that utilize GPS and proximity sensors to shuttle the passenger to their destination, without any input other than an address, are already being developed,” Rickert said. “Of course, it is much less expensive to just ride the bus.”

The Gazette: "As a Housing Coordinator for The Domestic Violence Intervention Program, the first question I ask a client is, “Do you have transportation?” If the answer “yes”, there are options available to them that people without transportation do not have. Unfortunately, for most of our clients, the answer is “No”. The Metropolitan Planning Organization of Johnson County’s Passenger Transportation Development Plan for 2015-2019 reported that “ … the most common issue facing human services programs is the lack of public transit service options to meet their [client’s] needs …. their clients spend too much time on bus routes”.
...
In the United States, “Only one quarter-25%- of low skill to mid skill jobs, (and 1/3 of high skilled jobs) are available to metropolitan commuters within 90 minutes via transit” (Tomer, Kneebone, Puentes, & Berube, 2011). This means there aren’t too many jobs to be had if public transit is one’s only option. Many victims of domestic violence have lost jobs or have been unable to accept a job offer simply because of a lack of reliable public transportation. This can be especially devastating to someone trying their best to rebuild their lives after escaping a violent home."

Wednesday, March 9, 2016

Columbia Missouri: Op-Ed: "That’s rather shortsighted, considering that according to the American Public Transit Association, for every dollar invested in transit projects there is a $4 return for the state. The positive impact of investment in our transit infrastructure can be seen statewide with the opening of the Kansas City Streetcar on May 6, the Loop Trolley in St. Louis under construction and OATS celebrating 45 years of service in our rural and urban communities."